Sold – James Monroe Defends Thomas Jefferson and the Presidency Itself

There were flood control levies on the banks of the Mississippi River in New Orleans since the city’s early days. Over time, the river deposited soil between those levies and its main course, and this new land (called batture) was valuable riverfront property whose title was in dispute. Edward Livingston was a New Orleans attorney and a member of the famous New York family of Livingston Manor. In 1807, he conducted a successful suit in the Territorial Court on behalf of a client’s title to a part of the batture and received a portion of that batture as his fee.

Livingston attempted to improve part of this land but his plan aroused vehement popular opposition, his workmen were mobbed and the work interrupted. Livingston appealed to Governor William C. Claiborne for protection, but the Governor considered it a hot potato and referred the question to the Federal government. Jefferson, who believed that Livingston had favoured Aaron Burr in the presidential election of 1800 and had afterwards been a party to Burr’s treasonous schemes, made it impossible for Livingston to secure his title by asserting the claim that such battures were the property of the United States. In response, in 1810, after Jefferson left office, Livingston filed a civil lawsuit against him personally for $100,000, then a considerable sum considering that Jefferson’s property was worth only $200,000. Thus, the case threatened devastating consequences for the former president.

Attorney John Wickham was the lead counsel for Aaron Burr in his trial for treason in 1807 and secured his surprising acquittal. Now Jefferson, attempting to put together a team of defense lawyers, sought to secure Wickham’s services. Wickham would eventually decline and, insultingly, opt to represent Livingston instead. Secretary of State James Monroe, for his part, sought to promote Jefferson’s defense. He wanted George Hay, U.S. Attorney for Virginia and the man who prosecuted Burr, to represent Jefferson (Hay was also Monroe’s son-in-law). In this letter to Hay discussing the lawsuit, Monroe indicates his belief that the cause at stake was of greater consequence to the U.S. government than to Jefferson. After all, whether right or wrong, Jefferson’s action in 1807 was taken in his capacity as president, not in a personal capacity. If presidents could be later sued personally for their actions in office by people who were dissatisfied, it would paralyze the executive branch of government.

Autograph Letter Signed as secretary of state, Albemarle, Va., May 23, 1810, to Hay. “I called the day after receipt of your letter on Mr. Jefferson and made the offer of your services to him in the suit of Mr. Livingston in the case of the batture. I saw no objection to your taking that step, indeed I thought there was a real propriety in it. He appeared to be gratified by the communication, and observed that he had already apprized you & Mr. West through Mr. Wickham whom he had also engaged in the cause, & since by letter, that he wished you to act in it. He will devote sufficient time to the investigation of it, & furnish his counsel with his argument. The government, however, will immediately take it up, as it is their cause not that of Mr. Jefferson. We are all tolerably well. Mrs. Monroe & I are hastening the repairs etc. to our house to receive you & family as soon as possible. Hortensia engages by her merit the attentions & affections of the whole family. She mistakes me for you, & by that cause I’ve become immediately a favorite.” The girl mentioned was Hortensia Monroe Hay, the future president’s granddaughter.

Autograph Letter Signed as secretary of state, Albemarle, Va., May 23, 1810, to Hay. “I called the day after receipt of your letter on Mr. Jefferson and made the offer of your services to him in the suit of Mr. Livingston in the case of the batture. I saw no objection to your taking that step, indeed I thought there was a real propriety in it. He appeared to be gratified by the communication, and observed that he had already apprized you & Mr. West through Mr. Wickham whom he had also engaged in the cause, & since by letter, that he wished you to act in it. He will devote sufficient time to the investigation of it, & furnish his counsel with his argument. The government, however, will immediately take it up, as it is their cause not that of Mr. Jefferson. We are all tolerably well. Mrs. Monroe & I are hastening the repairs etc. to our house to receive you & family as soon as possible. Hortensia engages by her merit the attentions & affections of the whole family. She mistakes me for you, & by that cause I’ve become immediately a favorite.” The girl mentioned was Hortensia Monroe Hay, the future president’s granddaughter.